Busting Concrete Ideals?

[karoc]

If money was no object I probably would not be asking for ideals but it is and just lack of it. So my project is how to bust up concrete that I believe is pretty dang thick and is setting on concrete footings. I have price renting a skid steer with a chip breaker which will cost about 600 for a day. But I am not sure that I could do it in days time since I have never been on one before. Another ideal is using something that is called Dexpan which you drill holes and pour this in hole which over time it will expand and crack the concrete. For a box of that it would cost about 120.00 from HD which is not terrible and doable. But I don't think that this will be able to do the job along. So I was thinking about renting a rotor hammer with 1 1/2 bit drill holes as long as I could as long as the drill bit will last. Kinda like a woodpecker how is starving. Then purchase box of that Dexpan and pour into some of the selected holes just to break it up to some to help. Then maybe get after it with skid steel to break it up to be able to handle by hand loading onto a trailer or move to low spot.
Description Concrete: In one pic the concrete beams is where a trailer house use to set and there is also concrete footing. Then next to it is a slap that was part of a garage but who knows how thick the top is and no ideal how thick the sides are that so sets on concrete beams about 10" down.
Using Locals: I have tried and tried and have had three different locals who clams they are a real company. But either they are swamp with work or saving my project just to fill in some time when all they are caught up which that has been about 2-3 months. So this may be turning into a DIY project,not because I want to but because I'm tired waiting.
So looking for new ideals,if you ever operated a skid steer with chip breaker do you think it would work?

 

[930dreamer]

I'd think an excavator with a thumb and a hydraulic concrete hammer would work best. The excavator will pick up and load into a dump truck/trailer easier. If you can get it all busted up what are your plans for hauling the concrete away?

https://www.sunbeltrentals.com/equipment/detail/1255/0350135/6000lb-mini-excavator-cab/

https://www.sunbeltrentals.com/equipment/detail/1100/0050500/hyd-hmr-2k-3-5k-excv-1k-1-5k-ssl/

 

[Northislander]

When i built my shop i had to remove about half as much concrete as that full of rebar i had a mini excavator on site but it couldn't break it up. Rented a 14" diamond bladed wet saw cut it in to smaller sections then broke it up with a 120volt concrete breaker then lifted pieces in to trailer with excavator took one day and it was a hard day.

 

[Gotcha640]

I would wait for a pro with a full size digger. Not sure where exactly you are, but wild guess, $3-6k.

I think one person with basically hand tools (mini excavator and below) would have a hard time getting it done in a week, let alone a day.

Maybe if the miniex had a jack hammer, or you rent a rolling saw (not doing that with a 14 inch diamond blade and a hand held, even if you have city power). If no saw, you're getting in there with a cutoff wheel to cut dangling rebar. A miniex isn't pulling it loose.

Miniex loading in to a dumpster is certainly better than a wheelbarrow, but still a lot of small pieces.

Still more like a week than a day. A day is a 150 foot French drain ditch from the back yard to the curb with no obstacles or roots or utilities.

What are you going to do with the space once the concrete is gone?

If you're building a whole new house on top of it, I'm pretty sure you can get the existing inspected to incorporate. If you're building a whole new house, you probably wouldn't be worried about the extra few thousand to get the work done.

 

[930dreamer]

In Amarillo I can rent a machine on Friday and return on Monday for a one day rental, your location may vary.

 

[Daniel Dudley]

I'd spend a little time trying to figure out a work around, like pouring footings around it and dropping gravel inside and out side of the new foundation walls later, or flat out burying it. Or incorporating the meanest part, and breaking up the rest. That one part looks solid. The foundation walls, not as much.

I have run a lot of jackhammers and broken a lot of concrete in my life, but that is a serious job even for a pro with all the machines. And depending on how much rebar is in it, it could be fairly tough to break out. The bigger the machines, the better it will go.

 

[matt_i]

I would dig around it a little bit, drill some test holes if you have the ability (SDS & a generator) to gauge thicknesses and depths.

In general if you undermine concrete away from solid bearing with the earth it gets *alot weaker*.

The bigger the machinery involved the faster it will go.

I see the Dexpan for around $42. Add a couple of consumables and I think you can get free shipping after carting up $45 worth of merchandise.

https://www.homedepot.com/p/Dexpan-...k-Breaking-and-Removal-DEXPAN11BKT3/204378789

 

[ace10]

I suspect that is a MUCH BIGGER challenge that you might be measuring it up to be.

 

[930dreamer]

You have to start somewhere, rent an excavator for the weekend and dig out that wall/footer and see if you can remove it.

 

[glentre]

You are going to find out how easy or difficult this job is going to be as soon as you determine what's in the concrete. If the slab has no wire mesh or rebar, breaking it up with a skid steer & chipper bar or even a rented electric jack hammer will go fairly quickly and that will probably take you two days or so. But that is not the hardest thing. Getting the broken concrete out of the way is the problem. From experience, you will not be able to move all those resulting chunks of concrete to a dumpster by hand by yourself if you are not superman. You will need a front end loader of some kind to scoop up the chunks and drop them into a dumpster or to bury them. I have never used Dexpan but it might work if there is no wire or rebar in the slab. But still, you would likely have to drill a lot of holes in order to break off manageable chunks and this would be very time consuming. I see no way you could use a product like that to break up a slab that had wire or rebar in it.

I have broken up a slab with wire in it using a rented big jack hammer and it is time consuming and frustrating because each chunk will have wires that need to be cut in order to move the chunk away from the slab. Some chunks will break away without cutting the wire but most won't. Hard to guess the actual size of your slab but, from experience, it would take you several days using a jack hammer. If you have rebar in it, forget doing it yourself even with the skid steer. In that case, I would recommend using an excavator to tear out everything and that likely could be done in a single day.

If I were you, I would try, as mentioned above, to work around the problem by burying the existing concrete or incorporating it into the new structure. If you can't do that, then getting a big excavator in to tear out everything fairly quickly would be your quickest and easiest approach in the long run.

Glen

 

[karoc]

Thanks guys for responding,I like the ideal of small excavator which I can get deliver to my place for about 300.00 from local tool rental place and while I have it maybe locate my sewer lines from septic out to field and the gray water line.Maybe rent rotor hammer punch some holes to help with breaking it up and to see about how thick all this is. I know the beams in left pic is about 8" thick and there is rebar in concrete.
My neighbor who lives few houses down and on water has a bulkhead that is wash out and he wants the concrete chunks to fill in,which he has bucket on his tractor. So all I have to do is break it up into pieces and cut rebar with cutoff wheel once get power. So like dreamer said I got to start someplace,in mean time I sure hope one of those guys who give me price to do work will come through before I start spending money.

 

[matt_i]

You are going to find out how easy or difficult this job is going to be as soon as you determine what's in the concrete. If the slab has no wire mesh or rebar, breaking it up with a skid steer & chipper bar or even a rented electric jack hammer will go fairly quickly and that will probably take you two days or so. But that is not the hardest thing. Getting the broken concrete out of the way is the problem. From experience, you will not be able to move all those resulting chunks of concrete to a dumpster by hand by yourself if you are not superman. You will need a front end loader of some kind to scoop up the chunks and drop them into a dumpster or to bury them. I have never used Dexpan but it might work if there is no wire or rebar in the slab. But still, you would likely have to drill a lot of holes in order to break off manageable chunks and this would be very time consuming. I see no way you could use a product like that to break up a slab that had wire or rebar in it.

I have broken up a slab with wire in it using a rented big jack hammer and it is time consuming and frustrating because each chunk will have wires that need to be cut in order to move the chunk away from the slab. Some chunks will break away without cutting the wire but most won't. Hard to guess the actual size of your slab but, from experience, it would take you several days using a jack hammer. If you have rebar in it, forget doing it yourself even with the skid steer. In that case, I would recommend using an excavator to tear out everything and that likely could be done in a single day.

If I were you, I would try, as mentioned above, to work around the problem by burying the existing concrete or incorporating it into the new structure. If you can't do that, then getting a big excavator in to tear out everything fairly quickly would be your quickest and easiest approach in the long run.

Glen

It would actually be pretty resonable with two guys working. One to run the 90# breaker hammer and the other with cutoff wheel to slice the steel. Its not out of the question to rent a 90 lb hammer and tow behind compressor. Yes that's 1960s technology but it works. My Dad had me on the hammer breaking up an old poured slab in my early 20s. Emphasis on finding young bucks lol. Too bad football season has already started or a local coach might want to give his team an "alternative workout" once its all broken in chunks

 

[glentre]

Karok,

I borrowed a small John Deere excavator with a shovel on one end and a loader bucket on the other when I did the slab with wire mesh in it. I thought I could break off pieces of concrete by getting the shovel under it and lifting. All it did was raise the rear of the machine....not enough power or weight on that kind of machine to do it. That is why I rented the jack hammer which worked slowly but effectively but I had to cut the wires with a bolt cutter to get the chunks dislodged from the slab. The mini-excavator wouldn't work with wire in the slab so I doubt you will have any success at all with a comparable size machine on concrete with rebar in it.

In order to get to the rebar to cut it, you would have to break up the concrete into small enough pieces to expose the rebar. That is not as easy or quick to do as it sounds. I am a DIY guy myself and hate to spend money to have others do things I can do myself. On the other hand, our types need to be realistic enough to know when to throw in the towel and hire someone with the equipment capable of doing the job if you have rebar in the concrete.

Your idea to rent a tool to do a test to see what is inside the slab is a good start. You may be surprised to find it's an old slab that is nothing but plain concrete with no rebar. That would guide you better on what approach to take to tear up the slab and make it much easier to do it yourself. Please keep us posted.
Glen

 

[Gotcha640]

No need for a driveway or boat storage or a shed or anything in the plans?

Have you got a quote on what new concrete costs? Just the pour is usually ~$6 a foot, plus rebar or mesh, plus dirt work to get it ready. 2000 square foot house could be $20k no problem.

My friends parents built their retirement home a few years ago, going from a field to a slab cost almost as much as the house they built on top of it.

A house that burned down in our neighborhood 20 years ago, lot was bought by the neighbor, it's been a basketball court and neighborhood hangout ever since. Take the slab out and it's just a muddy hole.

Do you really have to have it out?

 

[karoc]

Thanks for the support, it take me few weeks to get done with the power pole since there is a dead tree right next to it,so game plan is to remove the overhead wire which power company has alway killed power.Once that is done then cut tree down then build my service. Then I would like to dig around the beams and slab down below footing with excavator.Then I will have power for the rotor hammer to drill some holes to see how thick all that concrete is. Then maybe test with a jack hammer just to try get off cheap,yep it is necessary to remove cause I want to put building right where its at and run parallel with the road.Plus I will only have to remove couple trees to make some room.

 

[Redwngr]

If you want to know how thick it is, rent a concrete coring drill and bit.

One or more test holes and you will have better idea about thickness and reinforcing.

They are available in different diameters and body lengths.

https://www.catrentalstore.com/en_US/products/concrete-equipment/core-drills.html

Most places that rent to construction trades will have similar.



I think you might be overestimating the abilities of a mini-excavator

 

[karoc]

No need for a driveway or boat storage or a shed or anything in the plans?

Have you got a quote on what new concrete costs? Just the pour is usually ~$6 a foot,

You are spot on per sq ft. I got a price of 6 sq ft from a good local guy and I did my eye roll,good grief I been out of touch with todays prices. No house here but Pole Barn with living quarters and shop which plan on maybe 40x70.But if price of material keeps going up plans may change. If it was not for shop I would be retired by now but I don't want to just set and stare,I want to do what I like to do and build cabinets,metal working, and hope pick up some pocket change. We're down sizing and don't want nothing that big just want to be comfortable.
Where I'm at now its the property taxes that's pushing us out now,yes we are homestead.So our new for ever house will be lower taxes,lower insurance and no long lines at the no name grocery store.

 

[Jackfre]

Find out how thick it is. That will determine you’re options I think. If it is 4” you could use a concrete saw and cut grids. I ran a Kubota excavator with thumb on my daughters pool remodel. It carries 4x6’ pieces of concrete easily. Dig the disposal hole first. Concrete is not easy to get rid of. If you go the jackhammer route, screw those little hammers. Get a big compressor and a 90# Kent and it will get it done. It will kick your *ss, but they are the real deal.

 

[Red 17]

I took out footings for our old garage that looked a little like your pictures. I broke the slab up by hand and small jackhammer, and loaded it in a dumpster by hand. It helped with the seething anger I was dealing with at the time. But I couldn't touch the footings.

So, I rented a backhoe with a loader on it--your basic industrial tractor. It was kind of a POS but it pulled those footings out like butter. I lifted them up and let them fall on each other, breaking them into bite size pieces. Using the loader and some chain, I placed them gently in another dumpster. There was probably 10 to 15 lbs of steel in the whole thing. 3 small pieces of rebar, and the hold down j bolts.

Ymmv if you have any steel in it.

Good luck!

At the time I had a rental place close enough to go up and drive the machine back to our house. Very handy.